Sunday, November 12, 2006

Weekend Traffic

Work has been busy, busy, busy. We just held our last career workshop for this year, so we can breathe a little easy. Work goes on though and there's all the taking stock, writing of thank you letters that we do after each program.

Our program was held in Abuja and we had a blast! Can I say again just how peaceful Abuja is? The driving often leaves a lot to be desired, but it's nothing a Lagosian can't handle. It is actually possible to correctly estimate your travel times. The contrast was so obvious when I returned to Lagos. Yesterday, parts of two major roads in Victoria Island were blocked off. For people trying to get from VI to the Lekki-Ajah axis, it was a total nightmare because the two roads with closures (Ozumba Mbadiwe and Adetokunbo Ademola) were the most popular routes to get to Lekki Expressway. What bad planning. You would hope (though we know that this will never happen) that there would be some checking in on proposed closures to make sure that traffic choas does not ensue. But, what am I saying? Chaos is the norm here, so who cares, right?

I anticipated that there might be some bad traffic, but I just had to go out and get some yogurt. After getting stuck in total gridlock, I wasn't so sure that they were worth it. Anyway, I got home after spending just an hour and a half in the traffic. And I'm probably one of the luckier ones.

2 comments:

I lived and worked in Abuja for two years and I must say, they were the best two years of my life. I always say to my husband that if at all we ever had to move back to Nigeria (God forbid! :-D) then I will only move back to Abuja. I loved it, loved it, loved it. But then that was almost 10 years ago so I'm sure it's changed tremendously since then (for the better I hope)

Well, I'm sure it's changed a lot since you were last there. For the better, well, I can't say for sure. Abuja has more people, more traffic than when I first visited in 2000 (though still nowhere near Lagos).

There are probably more things to do (though, again, not even close to Lagos). Overall, I like!